


I Wonder What Happened to Her/Him?

by TempleCloud



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Other, Sex Change
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-23
Updated: 2020-07-23
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:14:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25463794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TempleCloud/pseuds/TempleCloud
Summary: Gender roles in Borogravia are changing fast.  Captain Blouse receives news from an old friend.
Relationships: Wrigglesworth/Original Character
Comments: 3
Kudos: 17





	I Wonder What Happened to Her/Him?

Blouse, old chap,

Congratulations on your promotion – and your marriage to Emmeline! Thank you for the iconographs of the wedding – iconographs in Borogravia! Whatever next? It was nice to see most of your ‘Monstrous Regiment’ in the group iconograph. It’s a shame your Private Goom has decided to retire, but considering how much she’d achieved in her short career – having waterproof boots, chewy sweets, and a mild expletive named after her – I can’t blame her for wanting to quit while she was ahead.

I’m sorry I wasn’t able to make it to the wedding, but I was in hospital at the time. Don’t worry, I’m fine – better than ever, in fact. In fact, I’ve got some good news to tell you. 

It all started when Major Scarfe called me over for a word. He said he knew I hadn’t been at the meeting, the one where the Duchess spoke through Private Goom, but he’d been one of the officers who was told to stay there, because Sergeant Jackrum knew his secret, and now he’d had to admit to all the other officers who were at the meeting that his given name was Gertrude, and now, well, he was wondering if I was another one like him.

So we talked for a while, and it turned out I was another one _very_ like Scarfe. He cried and said he’d felt like enough of an impostor when everyone thought he was a man, but he felt even more like an impostor now that his sister officers knew he was a woman. He said all the others had disguised themselves as men so that they could be soldiers, and he seemed to be the only one who’d become a soldier because he’d always wanted to be a man. I said I’d never wanted to be a man, but I really did like acting, not just the dressing-up-in-dresses part, and being a soldier had been just another role to play.

We talked about the new, more feminine, uniforms, and Scarfe said he was abominated if he was going to wear one of those, and I said I wouldn’t mind trying one on, if he could get one for me. So one thing led to another, and we started getting together discreetly to try on each other’s clothes, and one day when we were getting undressed, Scarfe looked at me and said, ‘I want your body!’ and I said, ‘Why don’t we swap?’

So we had a word with an Igor – there seem to be a lot more of them around in Borogravia nowadays, aren’t there, now that we’re becoming a more tolerant nation? Though some of the Igors don’t seem sure yet whether they can tolerate Borogravians. Mostly, I think they’re just not sure what to make of us – they’re still trying to decide whether chaps who cut an arm or leg off for their chums to eat during a siege should have priority for transplants because it’s an altruistic act, or have to wait longer because it’s self-inflicted injury. 

Still, the Igor we talked to was a very helpful chap, or possibly chapess, and was quite pleased with the way we were trying to waste as few bits as possible. We had wondered whether we should just swap our brains into each other’s heads, or maybe swap our whole heads at the neck, because it could be confusing if we were going around with each other’s faces. But Igor says they don’t do that thort of thing any more ekthept in catheth of brain death, becauthe it leadth to mithunderthtandingth. In fact, we met some of Igor’s long-term patients who have been living in jars for years or decades while they wait for a suitable skull (still attached to a body, obviously) to be transplanted into. Igor says it’th dithguthting the way tho many people who thuffer irreverthible damage from a thword to the thkull aren’t regithtered ath full-body donorth. We’ve both signed up now as donors, of course – the brains say they don’t mind if the bodies they inherit have had a few replacement parts.

It was all a bit more drawn-out than I’d expected, with a series of potions to drink, and operations, and recovering after our bits had been swapped over. But according to Igor, everything should work – if I manage to get pregnant in what used to be Scarfe’s womb, with seed from what used to be my personal equipment, I should be able to feed the baby myself, instead of needing to hire a wet-nurse. (Igor says it ithn’t ‘theed’ ekthactly – apparently, the bit in the Book of Nuggan about a woman being a field in which a man sows his seed is completely wrong. Let’s just say that I’ve got everything I’ll need.)

We knew we wanted to get married anyway, but I think we got to know each other much better, convalescing side-by-side between operations. After all, the marriage vows do include promising to love each other ‘in sickness and in health’, and I suppose most couples are ill together at some point, even if they’re just sharing a cold (according to Igor, this is because of ‘invithible thwimming demonth’ that swim from one person’s mouth to another when they kiss). But what with the war – most of the women in Borogravia hardly have the chance to spend time with their husbands until they’re brought back when they haven’t a limb left to fight with. At least now that we’re working towards no longer being continually at war with everyone, Scarfe and I might have a better chance than that.

I enclose a wedding invitation for you and Emmeline, and I wonder whether you’d mind being Scarfe’s best man? Nobody in his family is willing, you see, and you’re my oldest friend, so it would mean a lot to me if you were there.

I’ve already started practising writing my married name. Just because Borogravia is changing doesn’t mean all the old customs should die away, and I think it’s very important that the bride should take her husband’s name. So I’ll sign off,

Your old chum

Gertrude Wrigglesworth


End file.
